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A Sexual Abuse Conviction Is Reversed--Because of Interpreting
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Just last night, I read in my local paper that a deaf man accused of sexually abusing two girls ages 10 and 12 at the Maryland School for the Deaf (only a few miles down the road from us) got his conviction reversed on appeal.
Why? Because he wasn't able to question the interpreter's translation of his police interrogation responses.
The Court of Special Appeals here essentially said that this man had a constitutional right to confront and cross-examine his interpreter during his trial. But the interpreter was never called as witness because the judge said the interpreter was "not an accuser."
The man's lawyer insisted that, "With sign language you don't have the ability to give inflection... A lot of it comes down to mannerisms. When you are signing something for somebody...you can miss things."
Yet a total of seven girls between the ages of 10 and 13 had accused him of sexual offenses. What is the truth here? And was it really all lost in translation?
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DC Passes Cultural Competency Bill--about LGBT
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This could be a first in the country!
Our very own Washington, DC, has just passed a healthcare cultural competency bill that would require providers to get training about lesbian-gay-bisexual-transgender (LGBT) patients. Or more specifically, about the health challenges that affect members of the LGBT community.
The bill is not a "done deal." The mayor has to sign it, and there's a 30-day congressional review period to survive. But the local healthcare community apparently supports it due to research on health disparities. For example, the 2015 DC Trans Need Assessment reports that 19 percent of transgender individuals in Washington have been denied medical care due to their gender identity.
The bill applies to all licensed or certified healthcare providers in Washington. It is quite a bill!
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